4 min ⏱︎

Mental health is no longer a side conversation. It’s at the core of employee experience, engagement, and retention. As HR leaders, the challenge isn’t just raising awareness—it’s turning that awareness into action. During Mental Health Awareness Month, there’s no better time to reflect on how you can support your people using one of the most powerful tools at your disposal: people analytics.

The Silent Crisis—and a Strategic Opportunity

Increased stress, burnout, and work-life imbalance are affecting employee wellbeing at scale. According to recent industry data, over 70% of employees report experiencing burnout, yet most organisations struggle to quantify this or act in time. The result? Rising attrition, absenteeism, and disengagement.

HR Directors are on the frontline of this challenge—but they don’t have to navigate it blindly. With the right insights, you can shift from reactive to proactive, from anecdotal to data-driven. That’s where people analytics becomes mission-critical.

The Mental Health Data Gap

Mental health is complex, often invisible, and deeply personal. But that doesn’t mean it’s unmeasurable. What’s often missing is not concern, but clarity. HR teams are flooded with information—from surveys and feedback tools to absence data—but few have the systems in place to connect the dots.

People analytics platforms like illumin8HR are designed to help uncover meaningful patterns, such as early signs of burnout, erratic attendance, team-level engagement drops, disparities in wellbeing indicators across departments or demographics.

The insight? Data doesn’t replace empathy—it empowers it.

How People Analytics Drives Mental Health Strategy

Let’s look at specific ways people analytics can help HR teams take decisive action:

1. Identifying Risk Before It Escalates

• Use historical data to flag high-risk teams or roles
• Monitor sentiment and engagement in real-time
• Recognise when absenteeism or performance dips deviate from the norm

2. Measuring What Works

• Track the impact of wellbeing programmes over time
• Compare engagement scores before and after initiatives
• Evaluate manager effectiveness in supporting team wellbeing

3. Tailoring Support by Employee Segment

• Understand different needs across age groups, job types, or remote vs. in-office workers
• Create personalised interventions based on real-world needs—not guesswork

4. Driving Accountability

• Share wellbeing KPIs with leaders to promote a culture of shared responsibility
• Include mental health insights in regular workforce dashboards and leadership reports

Embedding Wellbeing in the HR Data Strategy

To truly support mental health, it must become part of the HR data conversation, not an afterthought. Here are key metrics to consider tracking with your people analytics solution:

• Absence and leave trends
• Employee sentiment scores
• Engagement and survey participation rates
• Workload and overtime patterns
• Utilisation of mental health resources

Importantly, this must be done with privacy and trust in mind. Employees must know their data is used ethically, respectfully, and in service of a better workplace.

The illumin8 Advantage

At Activ8 Intelligence, we help HR leaders go beyond dashboards—we help you transform insight into impact. Amongst many other things, our people analytics platform enables:

• Predictive analytics to forecast people risk
• Customisable dashboards to track wellbeing initiatives
• Self-serve ability allowing managers to access their own data insights
• Integration with other tools and HR systems

We work with HR teams across industries to not only surface the right data—but to empower you with the narrative and evidence to influence change at the top.

Five Actions HR Leaders Can Take Today

1. Audit your existing data sources: What wellbeing insights are you already sitting on?
2. Establish a mental health scorecard with a few high-value metrics.
3. Set up some bespoke analytics within illumin8HR to spot key risk areas.
4. Train managers to use data in understanding team wellbeing.
5. Build a case for investment using insights—not assumptions.

The Strategic Advantage of Caring

Investing in mental health is the right thing to do—but it’s also the smart thing to do. Healthy, supported employees are more resilient, more productive, and more likely to stay.

This Mental Health Awareness Month, HR leaders have the opportunity to lead with data and heart. Let people analytics be your lens for action—because every insight is a chance to make work better.

Want to see how Activ8 Intelligence can help you track and improve employee wellbeing?
Request a demo or contact our team to learn how illumin8HR can power your mental health strategy.